In 1978, Elvis Costello issued This Year's Model, his second album and his first with The Attractions. A tour de force from start to finish, thanks to high-octane numbers like "Pump It Up," "Little Triggers," "(I Don't Want To Go To) Chelsea," and "Radio, Radio," it remains not only one of his best records ever but one of the best products of the entire new wave movement.
Recently, Costello and producer Sebastian Krys recruited 19 Latin pop and rock artists from Central and South America plus a few from the U.S., to provide new vocals - entirely in Spanish - on top of the 42-year-old original album's instrumentation. As a press release notes, "the concept represents what may be a first: an artist replacing their vocals with newly recorded performances by other artists singing in another language, backed by the original music."
It's an unusual idea, all right, and, man, did it work out. The resulting album, called Spanish Model, retains all the
intensity of the original while adding fresh and vital Latin elements. It will undoubtedly help to make these Costello songs more accessible to south-of-the-border listeners. At the same time, it adds a new dimension for those who, like this writer, barely understand a word of Spanish.
As the saying goes, music is the universal language. And here's proof.
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